It's Raining
by Anomaliam
Summary: "It's raining the day Nick meets Stephen. Ten years later, he won't remember anything else about it. He won't remember what day of the week it is, won't remember what time it is, won't remember what he was wearing or doing. But he'll remember that it was raining." Can be read as Pre-slash. Part 1 of Time Stands Still, but can be read separately.


It's raining the day Nick meets Stephen.

Ten years later, he won't remember anything else about it. He won't remember what day of the week it is, won't remember what time it is, won't remember what he was wearing or doing. But he'll remember that it was raining.

Stephen's drenched when he walks into Nick's office. He knows who he is immediately; he's been one of Helen's two research assistants the past year and a half, and he's come along on one of Nick and Helen's expeditions.

Granted, even then, he didn't spend any amount of time with him. All he's really learned firsthand from any of that is that he's the outdoorsy sort that knows his way around a rifle. He supposes it's fairer to say that he recognizes him, because he doesn't really know him at all. He's just Stephen Hart, Helen's research assistant and understudy.

Now, Nick's out his own RA, lost to the perilous ailment that is maternity, and Stephen's on loan to his department. He doesn't like the way that sounds. "On loan." Like he's signed away his personhood as well as his spare time, becoming a grad student. With Helen as an advisor for his thesis, he'd bet he's short enough on that already. Albeit, he's not much better on his.

Water's dripping from his leather jacket onto the floor, and the front of his shirt where the jacket wasn't zipped all the way is soaked through and stuck to his chest. It's his hair, though, that gets Nick. It's sticking up in wild spikes on the top of his head when it should be plastered to his head from the water, as if in some sort of rebellion against the storm.

Or maybe it's just stubborn, he thinks. He has no way of knowing at the time just how apt a thought that is, not just about Stephen's hair, but about the man himself.

He's in his early twenties, but Nick's struck not for the first time by how young he looks. He's supposed to be his research assistant? As if he wasn't worried before. Maybe it's just the rain that makes him look that way.

He's read his file. Joint honours in Wildlife Biology and Conservation Science as well as Evolutionary Zoology. He has an average transcript. Good, but not particularly outstanding marks, only intramural football for an extracurricular, and a background in conservation that isn't particularly detailed in his file. According to Helen, he's a diligent worker, but not very bright. A good follower, she said.

Somehow, in that special way of hers, she made it sound like an insult.

It's when he gets close, up to Nick's desk, that Nick realizes maybe he's not so young after all. He still puts him in his early twenties (he's a graduate student, so short of being some sort of savant, he'd have to be). His file says twenty-two. But there's just something about him that seems older somehow. Or maybe older isn't the word for it. Experienced. Matured, in a way not many people Nick sees his age are.

It's in his eyes. He's got these crystalline blue eyes. Not like sapphire or the ocean; it's always sapphires and oceans with people. Nick doesn't find either particularly pretty, himself. Not that he finds Stephen's eyes pretty. Although, objectively—

He's getting off the point.

The point is, they're a very particular kind of colour. They remind him of the blue-green water of a river he once camped near on one of his expeditions, at the base of a waterfall. Calm on the surface, but raging underneath.

The way he holds himself is the same. He looks at ease, standing there in Nick's office, more than he thinks anyone ever does. Not anxious or uncomfortable, like most students are. Not irritated or unsettled like his co-workers tend to be. He's got one hand in the pocket of his oversized leather jacket, the other hanging onto the strap of his satchel by his shoulder, and a certain effortless ease to his posture. A stillness. And yet, Nick senses some kind of underlying restlessness. Potential energy just waiting to become kinetic. A gun, right before it fires.

It feels like a lie, almost. Like he's holding back, hiding something. Or maybe he's just reserved, although Nick doubts it's something that simple. It's unnerving, in a way. But interesting, in another.

He's still not convinced this is a good idea.

"Do I pass inspection?" Stephen asks suddenly. If there's any malice behind it, Nick can't tell. He just sounds curious, maybe a little bemused. He doesn't seem intimidated by Nick at all, and Nick gets the feeling he's being measured just the same as he's measuring Stephen.

This wasn't Stephen's choice, as he gathers it. Amongst the pool of research assistants in the Earth Sciences department, he's the one unlucky sod with the qualifications to be a go-between for Nick's field, until Nick can get a new one. Seems they aren't either of them particularly pleased with this arrangement. Still, he needs a research assistant, and while Helen's in Tanzania for the month, Stephen needs a thesis advisor. They'll have to make do.

"Suppose that depends."

"On?"

"You're not pregnant, are you?" He actually says it with a straight face.

Stephen's eyebrow ticks up towards his spiky hair. "Not so far as I know," he says. "But I was abducted by aliens last Wednesday, so it's a possibility."

He's kidding (Nick thinks ... Nick hopes) but he's got just as straight a face as Nick does. Straighter, maybe. He must be an ace at poker.

"You'll do," Nick decides. Up to that point, he wasn't sure. He still had a formal transfer request opened on his computer, to get Stephen sent to another office and stuck with another professor, if he didn't like what he saw. But he closes it, now. That seems more official than anything. He's made up his mind about him.

"I figured."

Confident little bastard, isn't he? Only he's not little. He's quite tall, actually, especially with Nick sitting down. He could scare the trousers off someone in a dark alley if you got him mad enough.

Could probably get someone's trousers off other ways, too, if he was so inclined. Nick's not blind, just married. And, as Stephen's supervisor for the time being, professionally disinterested. Never mind the school; Nick's got his own policies about that sort of thing.

He points to the desk sat caddy-cornered to his own, a few feet closer to the door. Sort of a crucible, for students seeking him out for office hours. Screening process would probably be the kinder word, but Nick doesn't enjoy it quite as much. "That's your desk over there," he says. "Do what you like with it, just as long as you don't lose anything important. There're tests for you to mark, and my first lectures at noon. Any questions?"

Stephen doesn't answer immediately. He walks back to the desk and thumbs through the three-inch stack of test booklets, then glances back up. "Answer key?"

"Never make one." That's not necessarily true. He did at the beginning, for Lisa, before she got the hang of things. But he's not interested in getting back in the habit. Best to set the tone early for these sorts of things. And he's curious. "Anything on there, you should know. Just use your discretion; I trust you."

Stephen's eyebrow ticks a little higher, and Nick wonders what part of what he just said is all that surprising. Then he remembers where Stephen's coming from. He imagines he's probably done more than a few rounds of exams for Helen, as her research assistant, and she's the type that has to have everything just so. He doesn't want to call her controlling, but the shoe's a neat fit. She's ... particular. Somehow, he doubts she'd give anyone the freedom to grade without telling them precisely what she was looking for.

Part of him expects some sort of follow up. He waits for Stephen to say something about how it was different with her (people are always comparing them, as if the same last name somehow fuses their personalities and not just their assets), or how he's not a professor so he shouldn't be doing those things on his own. How it's only his first day, and he doesn't know Nick well enough to know what he looks for on a test. The last, Nick might respect, but the rest seem petty. He's not sure he'd look kindly on any of them to be honest.

They never come.

As Nick watches, Stephen just shrugs out of his wet coat and hangs it over the back of his chair. No questions, no hesitation. He sits down, grabs a pen out of the Spice Girls mug Lisa left behind, and starts in on the exams.

He doesn't ask questions as he goes. Once or twice, Nick sees him get up, go over to the bookshelves and look around until he seems to find the one he's looking for, then pluck it off the shelf and go back to what he's doing. But he doesn't ask a thing. Nick's not sure if he thinks he's being tested himself (he thinks he actually might be; maybe Stephen gets a crucible of his own) or if that's just the way he is, but he can appreciate an assistant that's self-sufficient. Maybe there's a reason Helen's kept him around so long.

When it's time for Nick's lecture, he drops the marked exams in a neat stack on Nick's desk. His coat's already on, bag shouldered, and he's stood there with an expectant but not altogether impatient look on his face. He doesn't need to be told he's coming with Nick; he just is. And when Nick grumbles something under his breath at Stephen for holding the door for him, he just smiles a mock-pleasant half-smile and pushes it open wider.

A good follower, Helen said.

Only time will tell, but Nick thinks he might be a bit more interesting than she gives him credit for.


End file.
